Haki the Shetland Pony Read online

  for

  Kathleen Helen McTaggart

  Isobel Anne McTaggart

  James Harold Goldie

  with my love

  My thanks are due to Mr John Smith and his daughter Miss Eva Smith of Berry, Scalloway, Shetland, for their kind help

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  1. The Colt is Born

  2. Haki Begins to Learn

  3. Haki Leaves his Mother

  4. A Contest of Wills

  5. The Pony Show

  6. What Came of the Show

  7. Arrival at the Circus

  8. Circus Debut

  9. Friends and Enemies

  10. Fire! Fire!

  11. The Show Goes On

  Copyright

  1. The Colt is Born

  “Why are you taking your porridge so fast, laddie?”

  Mrs Cromarty watched Adam gulping down a spoonful of porridge so hot that it brought tears to his eyes.

  “Got to be at the school.” Adam almost choked on the words.

  “Guid sakes! You’ve time enough yet. Have you no’ finished your homework?”

  “Aye, it’s finished.”

  “Then why are you turning your inside into a burning fiery furnace? Take more milk!” Mrs Cromarty poured a generous measure of milk into Adam’s bowl. “Now, if it’s a game of football with Ian Sinclair and the other lads before the school starts you can just hold yourself back and take your breakfast quietly.”

  Magnus Cromarty, Adam’s father, watched Adam with amused eyes in which there was a hint of sympathy. At last Adam finished the porridge and the buttered barley scone that his mother made him eat. He snatched his school satchel from the hook behind the kitchen door.

  “I’m off now!” he said and fled before his mother could find any other excuse to keep him back.

  “Och, those lads and their football!” she cried as the door banged.

  Mr Cromarty smiled a little. “Maybe it’s no’ the football that’s taken Adam so early to the school.”

  “What then?”

  “Hecla is due to have her foal any time now. You know we promised Adam that this foal should be his own. He’ll be anxious to see if it’s born yet.”

  “He’s never going up over the hillside before school! He’ll be late!” Mrs Cromarty rushed to the door, flung it open and shouted “Adam! Adam!”

  “You can save your breath to cool your own porridge,” Magnus told her with a laugh. “The lad’ll be over the hill with the wind behind him now. He’ll never hear you.”

  “He’s crazy about that pony,” Mrs Cromarty said. “Every evening after his tea he’s up the hill to take a look at Hecla. I wonder that he gets his homework done at all. But this is a new thing, rushing up after breakfast.”

  Adam had doubled round the corner of the cottage and past the patchwork of his father’s small fields around the Shetland croft. He sprinted past the barley field and the potato drills, past the hay field and the small pasture with its few cows, through the rough tussocky grass where the sheep moved lazily aside as he sped upwards. At last he reached the stony Hill of Berry beyond, gashed with the black peat banks and covered with stubbly heather. This was where the Shetland mare, Hecla, grazed. Adam paused and his eyes searched the hillside. No sign of Hecla anywhere, munching at the new green shoots of heather.

  When her time was near, Hecla always sought out a sheltered nook to give birth to her foal, a place where she was sheltered from the easterly wind; where she could be hidden from other animals and human beings. All Shetland mares did this when their time came for them to bring out their young. Adam pursed his lips to whistle for Hecla, then stopped before the sound left his mouth. Hecla would want no one at this time. He must look for her quietly. He climbed higher still and stared over the moorland. School was forgotten! He remembered the old abandoned small quarry dug into the breast of the hill. He had seen Hecla nosing round there several times lately. He climbed above the quarry and came slowly and cautiously down to the lip of it. Hecla was there!

  She was lying on her side, her flanks still heaving with the effort she had made. There, lying between her legs, was the newly born foal, weak and slumped together. Adam drew in his breath sharply. “It’s born! It’s born!” he whispered to himself with fierce delight. “It’s born, and it’s to be my pony!”

  As he watched, Hecla stirred herself and lifted her head to look at her newborn child. She rolled a little, lifting her hind leg clear of the foal. Then she pulled herself round and nosed the little animal. Her tongue came out and she licked him gently, carefully, all over.

  “It’s a colt!” Adam said to himself in delight. “A lovely chestnut colt!”

  The little creature nuzzled closer to Hecla. He was no bigger than a medium-sized dog. His eyes were blind and would stay so for three or four days. Until he could see he would know his mother only by her smell. His nostrils flared wide as he drew in her scent. Both mother and newborn son rested and slept.

  Adam watched them fascinated, forgetting the time. From away down in the valley came the sound of a vigorously rung handbell. The teacher was standing on the school steps summoning the pupils. Adam started guiltily. No matter how he ran now, he would be late, very late! Reluctantly he turned away from Hecla and her foal and began the long run down the hill to the small town of Scalloway. He reached the road, its banks starred with the late May primroses of the Shetland Isles. Past the outlying houses he ran, their gardens hedged by the flowering currant. All his life afterwards when Adam smelt the sharp aromatic scent of the currant it called to his mind this particular day.

  “What shall I call the colt?” he kept asking himself. “It must be a fine bold name.”

  It was not till he reached the school door that he came down to earth. Miss Gourlay would have something to say because he was late. She would want to know the reason. Adam opened the classroom door as quietly as he could and slipped into his seat.

  “What kept ye?” Ian Sinclair, his desk-mate, whispered to him. Ian was Adam’s particular friend and confidant. “Was it Hecla?”

  Adam nodded.

  “Has she foaled?”

  “Aye.”

  “What is it?”

  “A colt. A beauty!” Adam could not help saying with pride.

  Ian knew the colt was to be Adam’s. “Man, you’re in luck!” he whispered.

  When the morning break came, Adam talked quietly with Ian in the playground.

  “The colt was only just born, Ian. I watched Hecla lick him over. He hadn’t even tried to stand and Hecla hadn’t risen either. I think she’ll be all right. It’s not her first foal. She might be thirsty though. There’s a little lochan not far from the quarry. I’ll take her some water from there in the dinner break. She’s sometimes been difficult about feeding her foals. There was one once that she left altogether and we had to feed it with a baby’s bottle. She’s more likely to refuse to feed him if she hasn’t got water to drink herself.”

  “How will you carry water from the lochan to Hecla?”

  “I’ll borrow a bucket from Mr Anderson, the caretaker.”

  As soon as the bell rang for the close of the morning session Adam tore out of the classroom and sought out Mr Anderson to borrow his bucket.

  Five minutes later Adam Cromarty was racing up the hill for all he was worth with a red plastic bucket in his hand.

  Panting hard, his breath tearing him like a knife, he reached the little lake and plunged his bucket into it. Then he sought out Hecla in her resting place inside the quarry. She was lying there with her colt beside her. He was no larger than a collie dog and had thin spindly legs that looked as if they would hardly support him.

 
“Hecla! Hecla!” Adam called in a gentle voice.

  The Shetland mare tossed the long mane of thick straight hair that fell over her eyes and turned her head to look at Adam. She was small and neat, not more than thirty-eight inches high from the ground to the top of her shoulders. Adam advanced a little closer and halted. He had to be particularly careful not to alarm her. The little mare was suspicious of any living thing that moved towards them and was anxious to protect her foal.

  “Hecla! Hecla!” Adam called softly. This time she recognized his voice. Adam was a friend. Adam went a few feet nearer and set down the red plastic bucket of water closer to her. Then he sat down to watch.

  Hecla eyed the bucket for a few minutes and caught sight of the glint of water within it. This might be some trap, though. She turned her head to look at Adam again. He was sitting on a boulder, not attempting to come any nearer. Cautiously she approached within a foot or two of the bucket, the foal nosing after her. She stopped again and sniffed suspiciously and looked all round her. Adam kept still as a post. Then she grew bolder and sniffed at the bucket. A moment later her nose was into it and she was drinking thirstily. At last her thirst was slaked and she lifted her head and looked at Adam.

  “Hecla!” he said persuasively and held out his hand towards her. She came at his call and nuzzled at his arms and hands and poked her nose into his pocket.

  “So you’ve not forgotten?” Adam whispered and felt in his pocket for the lump of sugar he had put there that morning. He held it out on the palm of his hand and she took it gently between her teeth. The foal missed her and whinnied nervously. She turned at once to him and stood between him and Adam.

  “It’s all right, lassie! I will not try to touch him yet. We’ll wait for that,” Adam told her reassuringly. “But one day that colt will come to me of himself.”

  The foal found Hecla and pressed his head beneath her and sought for milk. At first she moved away impatiently. The foal followed her. It was as though he needed protection and comfort even more than food. To Hecla he turned blindly for these. At last she stood still, calm in her motherhood, while he sucked.

  Adam drew a deep breath. There was no need to persuade Hecla to accept her foal this time; no need for bottle feeding.

  “She’s going to feed him. It’s going to be all right,” Adam said to himself happily. “Good lassie, Hecla!” She’s moving about now, too, and soon she’ll go down to the lochan herself for water.”

  Suddenly he remembered school. He snatched up the bucket and made off down the hill as fast as he could.

  That afternoon he tried hard to concentrate, especially in Miss Gourlay’s history lesson, and not let his thoughts wander to Hecla and the foal. Miss Gourlay was speaking of early Viking exploration of the western world and how Leif was the first European to discover the shores of America, long before the time of Christopher Columbus. The Shetlanders were proud of their descent from the Vikings. Suddenly Adam heard the word “Hecla” and his eyes opened wide.

  “The Norsemen put ashore two people, a man and a woman who were wonderful runners. They had to run through the country and explore it for two days and then come back to the ship on the second night with a report. Their names were Haki and Hecla. It is thought they might have been Shetlanders or Scots, but Haki and Hecla were the first people to explore America.”

  “Hecla!” Ian whispered and pinched Adam.

  “I know what I’m going to call that foal,” Adam whispered back. “I’m going to call him Haki.”

  “Haki!” he thought to himself. “A fine name! It’s just the name for the colt. Haki!”

  2. Haki Begins to Learn

  Every day Adam went whistling up the Hill of Berry to look at Hecla and Haki as they roamed the scathold, or common grazing land. On these moorlands the crofters have the right to graze a number of ponies or sheep according to the size of their small farms. The ponies range freely over the hill. Even in winter they are never brought into stables unless they show signs of illness. They are hardy little animals who prefer the open hill ground and thrive best on it. Their coats are thick and heavy and shed the rain so that their skins never become wet. In winter snowstorms they find shelter behind a wall or peatbank till the worst of the storm is past. Sometimes, if the snow lies for any length of time, the crofters bring the ponies down near their farms so that they can feed hay to them. Even then the ponies scrape with their feet at the snow till they have uncovered the rough coarse grass beneath, which they like better than hay.

  It was late May when Haki was born. As Hecla roamed over the hill Haki followed close at her side. When the mare stopped to graze, Haki sucked hungrily at his mother. His legs grew strong and supple as he gambolled about her. Whenever other mares became too curious or a human being approached, Haki flew to Hecla. The taste of her warm sweet milk in his mouth gave him comfort and protection.

  Adam was too wise in the ways of Shetland mares and colts to risk frightening the colt. He pretended to take no notice of him, but every day he brought a couple of lumps of sugar to Hecla. Always, as he drew near them, he whistled the same tune, then called to Hecla in a quiet voice. The mare twitched her ears when she heard him coming over the heather and lifted her head to watch for him. Haki ran to the side of Hecla furthest from Adam and dived under his mother for comfort. Adam always stopped a few paces away and called: “Come, Hecla! Come!” and held out his hand with the sugar on the palm.

  Hecla shook off Haki impatiently and came towards Adam, Haki striving desperately to suck from her. He hid beneath her as she took the sugar from Adam. Adam made no attempt to touch him at all. Day after day he went through the same routine till Haki got used to him. Then, one day, his patience was rewarded. Haki did not bolt beneath his mother at Adam’s approach but stood his ground and looked at Adam.

  “We’re getting on!” Adam thought in triumph. He looked towards the little colt and called gently, “Haki! Haki!” Haki lifted his head and looked at him again. The two eyed each other quietly and in that moment confidence was born in the colt and he knew Adam for a friend.

  The next time Adam came up the hill he brought some extra sugar in his other pocket. When Hecla came forward to take her two lumps from Adam’s outstretched hand Haki moved alongside her and did not hang back.

  “Haki! Haki!” Adam spoke very softly and held out his left hand with the other two lumps of sugar towards Haki. At first Haki shied slightly, but when Adam made no further move towards him, he regained his confidence. Curiosity got the better of him. Keeping close to Hecla he moved towards the extended hand and sniffed. The sugar smelt good. He gave a rasping lick of his tongue and the sugar was in his mouth! He backed away quickly from Adam but Adam neither tried to touch him nor drew his hand back too quickly. The first move between them had been made and accepted. That was enough for a beginning.

  Haki soon grew to expect his daily sugar from Adam. When Hecla raised her head expectantly as Adam came up the hill, Haki did the same. With her he came to Adam. Then, one day, as Haki munched at the sugar, Adam slowly brought up his hand and rubbed him between the ears. Haki flicked his ears in surprise and shook his head but he did not move away. When Adam continued to stroke his head, he found he liked it and stood still. When Adam moved away Haki followed him a step or two before he decided to return to Hecla.

  It was Hecla’s way to stick her nose in Adam’s pocket if he did not produce the sugar quickly enough to please her. Adam kept the sugar for Hecla in one pocket and the lumps for Haki in the other. Haki watched Hecla trying to push her nose into Adam’s pocket. He tried to push his nose in alongside Hecla’s. Hecla gave him an indignant push out of her way. Haki looked cross for a moment then gathered up his sticks of legs and frisked round to the other side of Adam. Adam held his pocket invitingly open. Haki hesitated only the barest fraction of a second, then sank his nose into the pocket and pulled out the sugar.

  “Good, Haki! Clever beastie!” Adam praised him. Haki tossed his mane as though he were pleased with h
imself too. This time he let Adam pat his shoulder and stroke him between the ears. Never, after this, did he shrink away from Adam. Soon, when Adam climbed the Hill of Berry, he called for both ponies, “Hecla! Haki!” and they both came to him. Then, one day, he called only for Haki. Hecla and her foal were lying in a warm patch of grass, asleep in the sun.

  “Haki! Haki! Come here!” Adam called.

  Haki’s ears pricked up. He hesitated, rose, then took two or three steps in Adam’s direction before Hecla woke up to the fact that Adam was there with the sugar. She rose to her feet and jostled Haki out of the way, but it was Haki who was first aware of Adam’s coming.

  Adam held out Haki’s sugar. “You know your name now, laddie! Haki! Haki!” he said affectionately as he caressed the little animal, rubbing his throat and under his mouth. When Adam moved away, Haki followed and thrust his head trustingly under Adam’s armpit.

  Adam was thrilled with joy at this show of affection.

  “Haki! Haki, you’re mine! We belong to each other and you know it!” he whispered to the colt.

  This time, when Adam went away down the hill, both Hecla and Haki followed him for a short distance, till Hecla found an interesting patch of grass for grazing. Even then Haki stood looking after Adam for a moment or two before he plunged his head under his mother.

  School and work on the croft went on side by side for Adam. Those were the long days of early summer in Shetland when the sun scarcely seemed to set below the horizon before it was dawn again. The simmer dim was the name the Shetland folk gave to the summer twilight, for even at midnight it was possible to see up the hill and for Magnus Cromarty to read his newspaper by the cottage door. Even the hens seemed reluctant to roost and the cock began to crow at an unearthly hour.

  “It’ll be fine the morn and we can start cutting the peats. It’s Saturday and Adam can lend me a hand,” Magnus Cromarty said on a Friday evening in June.